


Shatter

by ilovehowyouletmefall



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-06
Updated: 2013-09-06
Packaged: 2017-12-25 20:06:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/957098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ilovehowyouletmefall/pseuds/ilovehowyouletmefall
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jenny's alive AU. Season 8, after Angel killed Giles.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shatter

**Author's Note:**

> Same continuity as other Jenny's alive AU stuff I've written. Giles and Jenny had a daughter between season 3 and 4, her name is Anastasia.

I felt it when The Seed shattered. Not like the wiccans did, or the Slayers, but I felt it. Like a thin, important string had snapped inside me.

So when Buffy and Xander showed up, without him, I told myself that that’s what they’d come to talk about.

But Buffy… she couldn’t even look at me. And I knew.

Xander told me what happened. That it was fast. I started crying and he put his arms around me. I cried and wished that I could return to those few months, after Sunnydale, when we were together, working side by side, building something new and revolutionary. We were happy.

* * *

 

We go to London for the reading of the will.

Ani runs to Buffy when she  sees her, arms open, calling her name. Buffy scoops her up in a hug.

“You’re squishing me!” Ani says.

“Sorry!”

“Buffy, when’s Daddy coming back?”

Buffy looks like she’s been punched in the gut. “What?”

I step in. “I’ve tried explaining it to her,” I say.

“Ani, honey,” Buffy says carefully, “Your father isn’t coming back. He died.”

“But you died and you came back.”

“I know. That was different. I’m sorry.”

Ani starts to sniffle, so I take her into my arms.

Buffy looks devastated.

“I know I shouldn’t have brought her to this thing,” I say, “But lately I just don’t want her out of my sight.”

“I get that.”

It was a long car ride, and Ani falls asleep in my arms, crying.

The reading goes as expected. The family home is left to Anastasia Giles, to be administered by me. The money is left to me. The London flat and a yearly allowance is left to Faith. A few keepsakes for the others. It occurs to me that Rupert wouldn’t have discussed his will with Buffy, and maybe I should have warned her. She and Faith both look gobsmacked. But there’s only one thing I have to say.

“Buffy – I want you to know… I knew that Rupert and I wouldn’t have forever, And I knew that when he died, it would be for you.”

Buffy looks at me, wide-eyed. I remember what I said when I found out she was the Slayer. She looks so little.

“Are you trying to make me feel better or worse?”

“Honestly? I don’t know.”

Faith approaches me. “Hey, Jen. I, um, I’m gonna keep Angel at the London place.”

Angel. Everything keeps coming back to him. And Buffy. So much of my life, I’ve felt like just a player in someone else’s story, trying to figure out what my role is.

“Do what you want,” I tell Faith. “It’s yours now.”

Ani and I will go back to the country for now. But we won’t stay. It won’t feel like home anymore. The place is already filled with Rupert’s past, his family, their history. Which is Ani’s too, I suppose. But it doesn’t feel right to be there without him. I’m not the Lady of the manor. I’m just Jenny. Janna. And Ani is a Kalderash, too.

I think it’s time we hit the road. 


End file.
